Scooby Doo Otherworld
by Thor2000
Summary: Actually more in the style of the movie than the series, the gang returns to their school's old building to look for a missing classmate, and end up encountering something of a mystery on a worldly nature.
1. Chapter 1

Coeursville was founded north of Boston as a reserved community made up chiefly for wealthy residents after the Revolutionary War. The Blake family was one those families along with the Kingstons and the Weatherbys and a small gathering of others who created vast mansions atop the hills looking down upon the bay. However, over several hundred years, the wealthy and the affluent had to swallow their egotism and acknowledge the less than fortunate. A post office was erected in 1801 and then a City Hall, and the area became a town before the Civil War. From a population of a hundred and twelve, the town was now populated in the millions. Many of the descendants of the town followers were still around, and among them no one was more recognized than Daphne Blake, a beautiful red haired young lady with a life devoted to her friends. She and her long time beau and life partner, Fred Jones, the blonde son of middle income parents, had lived their lives since their early teenage lives as amateur detectives, a status well-known in town by even the local police. When most kids were studying, engaging in extra-curricular activities or just breaking the law, Daphne and Fred joined by Velma Dinkley, Norville Rogers and his large Great Dane were solving riddles or challenging themselves with local mysteries. Almost every agreed it started with the suit of armor in the driver's seat of a truck several years ago, but others thought it all started much earlier with something else. It had started with solving local mysteries, but the four of them and their giant dog had actually become local celebrities by busting rumored ghost stories and legends. Daphne had become a reporter out of college with Fred as her cameraman, but now with Velma and Norville, known affectionately as Shaggy by his friends, they were sort of freelance reporters bordering on amateur detectives.

The notoriety had escalated to something else. Television had inspired a cartoon based on them with creative plots and later more cartoonishly events from their real lives. Their hometown was always respelled as the fictional Coolsville, their personal traits were often exaggerated and the plots extremely ridiculous. Velma had never lived the cartoon. She felt it took away credibility from her and the others as exposers of local myth and urban legend. The rights they earned from the memorabilia based on the cartoons more than paid for their living and traveling expenses; no more running out of gas on lonely dark roads or flat tires on isolated country lanes. She was analytical and intellectual, everything else was arbitrary, but then that was the way it always had been. Her father was a professor, her mother a teacher and her siblings something else she was trying to decipher. If her mind wasn't working to solve a conundrum or eternal question, there wasn't anything else to think about.

Shaggy's main predilection in life was living his existence to its fullest and that meant sampling and eating every type of cuisine in the world. There was nothing he had ever refused, but he loved pizzas, hamburgers and hot dogs the most with every sort of gastronomic nightmare combination as possible. There was nothing he wouldn't eat covered with chocolate, but sometimes, he even found himself having to fight for food with his own dog, Scooby Doo, a great big lovable Great Dane with large brown eyes and an appetite to match Shaggy's own. Scooby was Shaggy's best friend and at times the dog was almost human by reacting to the same fears and frustrations. sometimes, Scooby uttered noises that were almost human and sometimes sounded like words, but only Shaggy could understand him.

"Guys, I think its time Scooby got out and said hello to a tree." Shaggy realized his buddy was getting restless by the way he maneuvered up and down the back of the Mystery Machine, the psychedelic colored van that carried them on adventures.

"Just a second, Shaggy," Fred turned down off of Main Street on to Weatherby Road and then into the entryway of Old Coeursville High School at the corner of the two roads. The two story structure of their old school looked down upon them. Daphne felt nostalgic for the place, and Velma recalled much enjoyed times in the school library. She almost wished she could live them all over again. Shaggy instead felt a feeling of apprehension. The dirty tan structure had been closed down a year ago in favor of the updated new school three blocks away. Dark windows seemed to be looking at him and the unkempt yard reflected on feelings of haunted houses he was still trying to forget. Fred parked the Mystery Machine by a blue Nissan Tempo, and Daphne emerged second after Velma from their van and just ahead of Scooby racing into the high grass near the forgotten flagpole. Stepping on to the cracked parking lot, Shaggy looked up with fear to the old school and looked from empty window to empty window.

"Hi, guys,"

The gang looked up near the side entrance to Jessica Danvers, their old schoolmate. Blonde, pretty and attractive in her tight blue t-shirt and old faded blue jeans, the Jessica Simpson look-alike hugged Daphne and Velma and gave Fred a platonic kiss to the cheek. Shaggy was watching Scooby sniffing through the grass as the blonde beauty and former cheerleader turned her head up to them.

"Jessica," Fred spoke first as their undisputed leader. "Why did you want to meet us here at our old school? I thought you had a job for us."

"I do..." Jessica confessed in the shadow of the upstairs library windows. "I need you guys to find my brother. I'm really worried about him. Nick's missed a week of work at the Institute and I don't know where he is. I think he's somewhere inside the old school."

"Inside?" Daphne looked up to old classrooms and the boarded entrance. "Why here? I thought the city had sold the old school."

"They did." Jessica walked up to the entrance with her feet scuffing the sidewalk. "To Nick..."

"To Nick?" Daphne wondered why would anyone want to buy their old school.

"I heard he wanted to convert it to a rooming house." Velma added analytically. "Did he have an accident in the restoration?'

"I don't know," Jessica paced back and forth before the entrance. "And I'm too scared to go in myself. Yesterday," She leaned in and lowered her voice. "I was outside the old gym and I heard..."

"Don't say ghosts." Shaggy told her.

"Okay, I heard spooks..." Daphne's old friend rolled her eyes.

"That's worse!" Shaggy shrieked as Scooby reacted about to pass out at his feet and leaned to him for strength.

"But something is making noises... " Jessica continued. "Whistling noises and loud booming crashes like an elephant walking around upstairs. I've heard whispering voices from the gym..."

"Well, there has to be a likely explanation." Fred replied. "I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll go in and look around a bit and then come out and tell you what we found."

"Yes," Shaggy turned brave. "They will go in and look around, and I will stay here and keep you company."

"We're all going in, Shaggy." Fred insisted.

"I was afraid of that." Shaggy looked to Scooby and rolled his eyes. Daphne gave Jessica a brief assuring hug and then joined the others in pulling open the left side of the boarded entrance. The front entrance looked clean and restored to how it once looked. Old trophy cases inside the doors were empty of old school awards and sports trophies to forgotten coaches, but they weren't completely gone, just moved to the new school. With thoughts of old teachers, forgotten friends, school events with old friends and even teenage hazing practices and titles in mind, Fred stopped and paused outside the old office. His hand grasped the aluminum handle and pulled it to him halfway expecting Mrs. Bursby and Mrs. Callis, the lady office workers, still at their posts with Principal Cantrell in back sipping coffee. Instead, Fred's eyes gazed upon the cleared room and looked upon a living room set in front of a dusty TV. The front counter and desks were gone. What had once been an office was now a person's home. Daphne peeked into the office at left and saw a small study with a solitary computer and smirked at the inspired novelty. Velma moved through the back hallway to the rear entrance of the office. Principal Cantrell's old office was a man's bedroom with posters of bikini clad women and old movie posters. The vice principal's office was an unfinished bedroom with scattered boxes of a person still in transition of moving into the former school and turning it into an apartment house. As she turned back to the outer office, she passed the teacher's break room, now a kitchen and dining area with Shaggy and Scooby emptying the two door refrigerator.

"You found the food?" She replied.

"If Scooby and I are going to be chased by ghosts, " Shaggy pointed out with one finger sticking straight up. "We are going to need our energy." He dropped a bucket of chicken take out as Scooby pulled slices of pizza out one by one from pizza boxes on the bottom shelf. Velma looked to Scooby seemingly nodding his head in agreement and turned away to rejoin Fred and Daphne.

"The old guidance offices across the hall looks like an arcade." Daphne announced. "He's got a pool table, foosball table, video games, an upright video game and a Nintendo system."

"Velmster, this way." Fred looked in and got their attention. Turning left at the end of the front hall and bottom of the front staircase, he passed the outside of the old bookstore and headed toward the classrooms encircling the hallway around the school gym. The gym was at the center of the school with an upstairs balcony and surrounded by forty classrooms at its circumference and in a north wing and a south wing. At the first of four entrances to the gym, Fred stopped and pointed to a computer station wired into the doors.

"What do you make of that?" He asked Velma to excise her knowledge to scrutinize their first clue into the first overt change to the location.

"It looks like Nick has wired a computer lock into the gym doors to keep them closed." Velma realized and looked up to Shaggy and Scooby catching up with them carrying sandwiches. "I wonder why he would do that."

"To keep the ghosts locked in, mystery solved, let's go." Shaggy started to turn to leave, but Daphne was holding him back.

"Simple electromagnetic lock, but I'm sure I can open it." Velma picked up the keyboard and started typing keys to decipher the program.

"I know Nick hated gym class," Daphne turned her weight to her other leg. "But a security lock on the gym? Are the other entrances like this."

"I checked," Fred answered. "He's got it blocked off. Whatever is there, he wanted this to be the only entrance in or out." There was a pop, the sound of a bolt sliding to the side and then the groan of doors creaking open to the inside. Velma placed the keyboard aside, slid her eyeglasses up her nose and strolled it first ahead of her friends. Memories rushed to her as she revisited the gym. The humiliation of being picked last for girl's basketball came rushing back as Daphne recalled pep rallies and school dances. Fred looked with pride to the basketball goals while Shaggy looked up to the track on the upstairs balcony around the gym. Scooby was strolling forward sniffing the faded gym floor as the mental ghosts of the gang's youth rushed forward to once again inspire nostalgia for old memories.

"Look," Shaggy pointed upstairs. "I don't see any light from the upstairs entrances. They must be sealed too."

"Nick!" Fred called out. His voice bounced back from the steel girders holding up the round dome ceiling of the gym. No one appeared or sat up from the upstairs rows of bleachers. Desiring a drink of water, Fred turned to the side of the entrance for the water fountain, and instead found solid wall in its place.

"I could have sworn there were water fountains in the gym." Fred looked round. "And look, the symbol of the Cougars is missing. Nick must have covered it up."

"It hasn't been covered." Velma leant down to the floor. "I can still see the floor panels. It's just ceased to exist as if..." There was a loud thud from behind her as if the doors had slammed shut, but looking back, she could still see hem open. Scooby had jumped into Shaggy's arms at the noise. Daphne scratched him behind the ears to calm him down and remind him he wasn't alone.

"I need some chemicals from the Mystery Machine." Velma stood up straight. "I want to know how Nick removed the school symbol from the floor."

"And I'm printing a copy of the school plans." Fred led the way back to the front entrance out of the gym. "I know there were water fountains in the gym. God knows what else he changed."

"Guys..." Daphne stood outside the doors to the main office. "Look..." They all stopped and looked back. Nick's furniture and living room set was missing and the school counters, desks and chairs were back as they had always been. It looked practically the same as it had always been, but had it? How did it revert back within a few minutes?

"Okay, " Fred tried to think. "This is starting to get creepy."

"Let's get the gear from the Mystery Machine..." Velma forced herself to turn to the front doors. Pushing them open, she was hit by a blast of bright light from the sky and a light breeze blowing across the school grounds. When they had arrived, it was just a little cloudy, but now the sun was out and the clouds were blowing away. She turned the the direction of the Mystery Machine and looked to the empty spot where it once sat.

"Jessica's gone." Daphne realized. "The Mystery Machine is gone."

"She stole the Mystery Machine!" Fred didn't know how stupid he sounded.

"How could she?" Shaggy observed. "She had her car here too!"

"Maybe she had someone with..." Velma started with an theory and stopped. "Look!" She pointed across the field to the main road. It was always busy, and consistently congested with traffic, but now it was a parking lot of abandoned cars strewn around. One truck was on its side, and a sedan rested on its side. On the other side, the shopping store was deserted. The usual sounds of town and people were missing. Coeursville sounded empty and devoid of life. They had only been inside the school for roughly fifteen minutes. What had happened to the town while they were inside?

"Where's all the people?" Shaggy asked.


	2. Chapter 2

2

Four lone figures wandered up the street in surprised and petrified shock. There wasn't another living thing in sight. Automobiles were left abandoned in the street as if they were parked in traffic and left behind by their owners. A vacant bus rested in the middle of the bridge over the Saugus River. A lone empty rowboat floated abandoned under one side and out the other while the empty sounds of a deserted town greeted the amateur detectives. The door on their old soda shop flapped back and forth in the breeze. The museum where they had a few months ago recaptured Professor Jacobo was entirely abandoned. Not a person came to see them. Not a bird ascended the sky. It was almost as if the town had been evacuated in the space of all of twenty minutes. Fred spanned the skies with Daphne clinging to him. Velma picked up a newspaper floating by her. It was from a week ago. Shaggy checked the door of the Blue Sky Oriental Buffet Restraunt trying to get inside it. It was sealed up tight. As he joined his friends on the front steps of the museum, he looked to them for answers.

The road to south to Boston seemed equally dismal. Fred had entered a telephone booth and tried to get a operator, but the line was dead. Daphne tried to check her cell phone, but it was dead too. Squeezing himself into an open Volkswagen, Shaggy tried to start it up, but there was either no gas or no juice in the battery because it wouldn't start.

Scooby meanwhile wandered down the line of the street as if he were walking a tightrope. He didn't seem scared, he just walked forward with his head low. His eyes furrowed at the ready for signs of life, his ears perched trying to hear something. Upon a lone hot dog stand, he poked his nose through for a scent of wieners or taste of buns, but it was cleared out. With his stomach growling and a whine from his lips, he was afraid of what they were expected not to find.

The Coeursville Methodist Church which they had long belonged to was as empty as a grave. Its pews dusty and its floor littered with fliers and Bibles both open an laying closed. Police cars were parked at the ready before the police station. Locked up tight, it was clear that no one was on duty. The town square especially down the block was devoid of life. Only their own echoes greeted them. The silence was almost deafening.

To Velma, it seemed they were the last people left on earth. The town still stood around them like the back lot of a movie set after the actors and crew had left. Only a few cars laid upside or on their sides. If something spectacular had happened, she would have figured all of them bunched together; it seemed everyone just got up and had left while something else came through and periodically knocked them over. There were no sounds but for the wind, their breaths and the noise of their shoes scratching the ground.

"Velma..." Fred got over his stunned shock. "Talk us down... you know what's going on. Please, tell us what's going on."

"I have no idea." Velma looked up and down the front of the museum and back to Fred. Obvious fears welled like tears in her eyes. "I have no idea what's going on."

"No!" Fred grabbed her by the arms and shook her. "You know! You know everything. Tell us, tell us now!"

"Fred!" It took Daphne and Shaggy to pull him off her, but he was just scared like them and maybe a little more panicked. As he recomposed himself and apologized under breath, Velma adjusted her glasses. She noticed her hands were shaking just a bit. Her breasts rose up under her orange sweater as she took a deep breath.

"My only theory is that..." She started guessing not by the evidence, but by TV and movie scenarios she had seen. "Somehow, someway, we've stumbled into another quantum reality... an alternate timeline which has diverged itself from similar but like events to events in our past. Think about it, what if we had never recaught Jacobo, if President John F. Kennedy was not felled by an assassin's bullet, if Hitler had won the war, if the South had won the Civil War... if... maybe... we had never come together to solve our first mystery in 1969..."

"You mean..." Daphne tried to comprehend what she was saying. "We've traveled in time?"

"Actually," Velma walked around Shaggy and stood before the steps to the museum. "True time travel such as exiting the time stream and re-entering it in the past or present is impossible; our past can never really be changed and therefore it can never be reached, but our future has always existed as multiple alternate possible future timelines ahead of us determined by the choices and decisions we make here and now. Technically, after reaching one future, the points to those alternate futures still exist even long after we've passed them and become the alternate quantum realities which co-exist in tangent to our own. Theoretically, Nick must have stumbled through the same inter-dimensional doorway which we have passed through to get here."

"Then..." Fred thought out what she had said. "All we got to do is find Nick and head back through the doorway in the school."

"Theoretically," Velma repeated herself. "But bare in mind, this is only a working theory right now. I could be wrong."

"Worst case scenario?" Shaggy asked, but then Velma started to answer him. "Don't answer that!"

"Okay, this is my plan..." Fred now found the strength and will to become their leader again. "Daphne and I will go north to the library since Nick likes reading. Velma, you take Shaggy and Scooby down to Colonial Apartments and see if Nick is in his apartment there. If we don't find anything, we meet here again in front of the museum in one hour, right?"

"Right." Shaggy looked around afraid, then felt a bit braver with Scooby by his side. "You're not scared, are you, Scoob?"

"Uh-uh, uh-uh." Scooby reacted almost human for him. Velma was a few feet away from them as they walked down the center of the street. Cars dotted around them parked in silent defiance to their presence. A few of the expensive cars were sealed up, but several were open with windows partially down or all the way down. One station wagon had a basket of laundry in it and a cherry red Jaguar they passed had a baby seat in the passenger side. An empty plastic soda bottle scratching across the street surprised Scooby enough to jump up into Shaggy's arms. After a pleasant laugh at each other, they looked up the street to Fred and Daphne. They were five blocks away and mere specks in the distance.

"Come on, guys..." Velma grinned a bit at them as they started passing the Crescent Hotel at the corner of Decatur and Demonbreun. Five stories tall and encompassing fifty rooms, it's high roof blotted out the sun from them. As Velma's eyes glanced and bounced off the front of the Indian Red brick structure, she noticed a curtain drop back into place as if someone had just pulled it back to see them.

"Guys, someone's in the hotel!" She rushed up the front stoop and through double doors for the second floor room with the bedroom. Shaggy and Scooby only got as far the front lobby and admitting desk. Shaggy just looked up that ascending stairway and was reminded of every bad dream, both real and imagined they ever had.

"Uh, we'll wait here..."He then realized Scooby was on his hind legs like a person and hitting him in the shoulder for his attention. Making excited happy noises, he then turned Shaggy's head to the dining room and they both looked upon a table of food out in the open. A platter of fruit sat on a glass platter a foot above plates and platters of steaks, chicken legs, complete hamburgers, vegetable combinations, pizza slices and every sort of dish he would imagine in this hotel. They slid into place and salivated upon casseroles, omelets and stews and stacks of fried chicken, platters of lobster and shrimp and cubes of cheese stacked upon silver platters.

"For this meal we are about to receive may we be truly grateful!" He and Scooby prayed together in rushed unbridled haste. "Dig in, Scoob!" Shaggy grabbed a chicken leg in both hands and Scooby dumped a plate of steamed shrimp into his mouth before scarfing the slices of crab. Shaggy took a handful of cubed cheese and Scooby took a chunk out of a slice of Swiss cheese. Barely chewing, they just started swallowing anything they could get in their mouths. More food landed on the floor during their rushed stuffing marathon as vegetables, stripped bones, pizza crusts, lobster shells and a banana peel took to the air on their way to the floor. However, as the taste hit them, they stopped and looked each other with swollen cheeks. They blinked their eyes at each other and realized the same thought before spitting out the contents of their mouths to the floor.

"It all tastes like dead air!" Shaggy complained as Scooby used the dining table sheet to scrape the awful taste off his tongue. "What is this? Some cruel joke?"

"Raggy..." Scooby made the noise that sounded like Shaggy's name, then stuck his nose to the floor and started sniffing the way through the buffet line to the dining room. Through another set of doors, the oriental carpet led to a wood podium and a set of human feet in women's black pumps. Scooby and Shaggy then slowly lifted their gaze up over the brunette phantom matron with the glowing blue eyes and dark dress. Her hair was pulled back, her skin pure white and her body was transparent enough to see a room of phantom diners of varying style, shape and appearance. Some looked like decomposing corpses while others looked like dried out skeletons. Ghosts of Union and Confederate soldiers mingled with Revolutionary War soldiers and World War Two troops. It was a room full of immaterial, disembodied ghosts, spirits, phantoms, apparitions and specters from every moment in American history. They sat at tables eating, conversing, dancing to a spectral band and laughing at each other jokes. Only the spectral matron noticed their young guests and she beamed harmlessly to Shaggy and Scooby.

"Do you have a reservation?" She asked.

"Nick!" Velma yelled through the second floor. But for a few, the majority of the rooms stood open, empty and desolate. A few suitcases were left open on beds while some beds looked turned down for bed. Trying to find her ways back to the staircase, she turned on her heel confused and lost and then reached up and tried to figure out which direction she had come.

"Do you need help?" A voice asked.

"Yes, how do I get back to the..." Her eyes looked up to the tall bald security guard. He was transparent and immaterial and his eyes lacked any visible irises. They were completely white. Velma just reached up to check for another stupid mask and noticed her hand passing in and out of this spirit's head. It responded confused to her behavior and waited patiently for her response.

"Jinkies..." Velma realized what he was. "You're... you're..."

"Metabolically-challenged?"

Velma screamed and took flight running through the hotel. She dashed round a corner, into an apartment and slammed and locked the door. Her breath was racing and her heart was pounding. There was movement out the side of her eyes and she looked into the open bathroom by the door. A white-skinned female ghost sat in a bubble bath up to her chest. Her midnight dark hair was tied up, her pitch black eyes looked matter-of-factly upon her and her hand supported a crystal glass filled with white wine.

"As long as you're here," She asked the young lady in her room. "Would you get my back?"

"You know, Daphne," Fred and Daphne continued down empty Commerce Boulevard past empty restraunts, deserted stores and desolate shops. "I've been thinking, it seems as if our cases are getting bigger in size. I mean, first we had the demons on Spooky Island, then we had our worst enemies brought to life by Professor Jacobo and now we're in an entirely new reality without any idea if we're going to get home."

"I know..." She looked up at him trustingly and squeezed his hand tight. "But at least we're together." Her eyes caught a glimpse of her favorite dress shop and the dress in the window. It was a white shoulderless, strapless gown with a full skirt and red belt. She would look so good in that dress. Looking to Fred briefly, she clenched her purse tightly and dashed into the dress shop. Within minutes, she had the dress off the mannequin in the window and was looking for a dressing room. Fred just continued walking and talking down the street thinking she was still behind him.

"I feel the same way." Fred talked to the empty air. "I mean, I've been thinking a lot about this and, well, you know I care about you, and I think you care about me, so, wouldn't it be natural for the two of us to take our relationship to the next level. Now, I'm not talking about the purely physical stuff, I don't want to put you in that kind of place, that is, unless you want to be there. I mean, maybe the two of us ought to make it official. I don't have a ring or anything, but, Daphne, I was wondering if you'd like to be my..." He started looking around and discovered he was by himself. All this time spilling out his heart to her and she was gone? He started feeling like an idiot.

"Daphne? Daphne?" He looked around the empty street of vehicles and discarded objects. "I am going to put a bell around her neck! I mean, here I am, about to..." He heard something. It sounded like a loud thump of weight striking the earth. He looked to his reflection in a puddle of water and watched his refection ripple with the next loud impact tremor. That sound was louder and much closer. Fred just stared at the still water return his reflection and then ripple with the next elephantine footstep.

"No..." Fred was scared to think what it could be. "Not that. Please, this isn't Jurassic Park. I don't want to see a dinosaur." He heard the footstep again. It was just around the corner. "Please, God, let it be a plant-eating long-necked whatchamacallit." There was another footstep as the creature started coming closer.

"Two footed, bipedal..." Fred started rationalizing. "That's not good. Well, if I don't move it can't see me."

There was another giant footstep.

"Daphne..." Fred's voice whined and he started looking for company. "Nick? Velma... I'll even settle for... Shaggy!"

His eyes reared skyward to the edge of the office building blocking his view. Human fingers about as thick as steel barrels and as long as electrical poles curved around the edge of the sixth floor preceded by the two tons hands and twenty foot long arms of a giant person, a giant female person whose bosom was dressed and covered by ragged, flapping bed sheets and whose lower body was dressed in something like at tarp pulled and held up by a rope tied tight round the hips. The sun hit Fred's eyes as he cocked his head higher. Long strands of red hair framed the face of the woman impersonating actress Allison Hayes as the Fifty Foot Woman. Up above the flawlessly toned abdomen, perfect skin, and jutting Volkswagen-sized breasts, the green eyes of Daphne Blake looked down to earth as a goddess who had found the secret of immortality.

"Oooooo..." Her ruby red lips were caressed and moistened veraciously by her moist tongue. "Someone I haven't eaten yet."

"Daphne?" Fred asked himself if he was hallucinating. Nothing in this case was making sense. "Oh, my god! What happened to you? How did you get this way? Are you okay?" He watched as her bare feet crunched the street under her. Her foot length had to be almost six to seven feet long and with her incredible height, her increased weight at least seven to eight tons. She wouldn't be able to move very fast carrying that much weight, but anything she stepped on would be crushed flat. He slowly stepped back as she came closer to him. Her shadow stretched over him and blotted out the sun. Fred felt as if he were a mere child to her as she leaned her body forward and reached to pick him up.

"Daphne, stop it," he dashed between her legs and ran behind her. "What are you doing?"

"Well," She grinned harmlessly with a toss of her hair. "I'm eating you, of course."

"Why would you do that?" He answered grinning as if she was just kidding.

"Duh, it's what I do?" She explained herself and braced on the pillars of the bank to keep from falling over at her height. When the marble pillar collapsed and she started to fall, Fred dashed out of the way and through a gate into an alley. There was no way she was going to squeeze through the alley. It was only seven feet wide, but as he looked back, he saw her squeezing through sideways like a bratty child after a toy she wanted. Coming out to the back entrance, Fred chanced upon a familiar green psychedelic van he knew very well.

"The Mystery Machine!" He raced to it, pulled open the door and got into the driver's seat. Sticking the key into the ignition, he began pounding the gas pedal with his foot. "Start, darn you, start! No!" The windshield filled with the sight of four immense finger prints on fingers each a feet thick. The Mystery Machine tilted backward and faced heavenward as the back doors popped open. Held sixty feet off the ground, Daphne opened her mouth wide and started shaking the chassis of the van over her open gullet. Clicking his seatbelt, Fred looked down into her throat, through her cleavage to the ground far down below. Even if he didn't land in her mouth, he'd never survive the fall.

"Daphne, for the love of God!" He screamed at her and held on for his life. "What's wrong with you!" Her shaking began getting even more vicious and impatient. Hissing and screaming, she started shaking the van harder and harder. Fred hoped even if he was knocked cold that the seat would stay bolted.

"Hey, you guys, you need to pay for the food you ate!" A ghostly cook chased Shaggy and Scooby through the hotel kitchen, basement and up into the lounge. Ghostly by-standers watched the chase with little to no interest. One spectral gambler with a tight skull-like face and no eyes placed a bet on Shaggy and Scooby to escape. A ghostly waiter dropped his tray as the boy and his dog raced through him. A ghoulish maid fooling around with a guest in a closet peeked out at the fracas going on. The ghostly cook slid to a stop after losing sight of his unpaying customers. As he started looking round, Shaggy and Scooby strolled by him casually while wearing tuxedos and talking on cell phones.

"Can you hear me now?" Shaggy asked the person on his cell phone. He took a few more steps. "Can you hear me now?" He noticed the incorporeal ghost. "It's for you."

"Thank you." The ghost took the phone. "Hello?" It took him only a second and he screamed a loud hollow moan. Upset for being so stupid, he recognized the guy and his dog and chased after him again. Shaggy and Scooby raced up the staircase to the next floor from the lounge and on the balcony followed it to the front of the hotel. Shaggy and Scooby were racing side by side. There were ghosts everywhere, but instead of all teaming up together against him, they just watched and observed just like the people they once were. The hotel was definitely haunted, but the ghosts were not out to scare him. In fact, he was sure they could have lived together in peace, but he wasn't going to stop and test that theory. As he raced for the stairs to the lobby, he hit someone quite solid.

"Shaggy!" Velma looked at him on top of her. "The hotel is haunted!"

"Now you tell us!" He lifted her over his shoulder and raced down the stairs to the admitting area. Racing past a couple of honeymooning ghosts and a spectral bell boy with a skull-like head, Shaggy was screaming his lungs out as he and Scooby hit the street once more with Velma.

"I know we're ghosts, but that is just rude!" The phantom concierge at the front desk groused and folded his thin arms.

"Okay," An extra skinny house maid in a black dress and white apron posed with a broom in her hand. "Who left the mess in the buffet line!"


	3. Chapter 3

3

Shaggy, Scooby and Velma had reached the Colonial Apartments, noted its boarded up appearance and turned back convinced that Nick Danvers had not made it inside. Returning back to their rendezvous spot, they took the long way over to Clinton Street and then up to the main road to avoid crossing in front of the hotel again. This part of town was just as deserted as everything else around them. Restraunts, stores, business and deserted automobiles filled this vast ghost town. Velma's mind was processing everything she saw. Nothing looked like the town had been deserted. It was only as if everyone had just got up and left, but to where? Where would they go? On one level, it seemed as if they were all on one vast movie lot missing characters to fill the city, but on another level, she felt as if something terrible had erased everyone against their will. She began thinking over every TV series or movie about the end of the world. In her ears, she detected distant rumbling as if something in the earth was about to explode.

"Guys, do you hear that?" She tried to figure out what it was.

"Yes, it's my stomach." Shaggy confessed. "Scoob and I haven't eaten in an hour and we're hungry. I mean, we thought we'd found some food, but it tasted horrible, like stale air. It didn't have any taste or any substance to it."

"Like maybe it wasn't real?" Velma started wondering about that, then looked up and noticed Daphne coming toward them wearing a long fur coat, several necklaces and sunglasses while carrying four handled shopping bags filled with dress and shoe boxes. She certainly looked pampered and and she certainly looked over-indulged. She grinned ear to ear to Velma and Shaggy with her pearly white teeth lighting up in the sunlight.

"You've been shopping?" Velma looked her over head to toe.

"Technically," Daphne pulled down her sunglasses as if she were a movie star. "I was looting. I found the most perfect evening dress and then I needed shoes to go with it and then I noticed this coat and I thought..."

"Forget the Home Shopping Network revue..." Shaggy cut her off and held up his hand to stop her. "Where's Fred? Did the ghosts get him?"

"Ghosts?"

"We found this entire hotel filled with ghosts of every sort." Velma explained. "They tried catching us for a change..." Velma looked to Shaggy and Scooby. "But we escaped. I don't know if they wanted to hurt us or not, but... I think we better get out of this world before sunset. I don't think I want to be here when they fill the streets."

"I don't know where Fred is." Daphne looked around and removed her sunglasses. "I thought he had come back here because I never made it to the library."

"We'll check the way you came." Velma became temporary leader as she started heading north up to the city library. "Maybe Fred found Nick or..." They heard a noise from the alley between the Chinese and Italian Restraunts. There was a loud thud of trash cans knocked over and a crash of the falling cans and Fred dashed out with his blue shirt torn and hanging open and his usual perfect coif of blonde hair disturbed. He whirled round and looked partially insane to Shaggy and Velma then regained a trace of his humanity once more.

"Shaggy, Scoob, Velma..." He was excited to see them again, but then he saw Daphne in her long faux mink coat looking at him. At first, he recoiled in fear of what she had done to him, but instead, he decided to forgive and pulled her close.

"Daphne!" Fred was incredulous as he squeezed and hugged her. "You're back to normal!"

"Uh, yeah..." Daphne rolled her eyes confusingly and looked for answers from Velma and Shaggy.

"Please tell me one thing..." Fred held her at arm's length. "Why did you try to eat me?"

"Eat you?" She looked at him and wondered if he was going crazy. "Fred, I don't like going in the bathroom after you."

"Daphne," Fred shook his finger at her. "Just ten minutes ago you were fifty feet tall, doing your best Allison Hayes impression and shaking the Mystery Machine over your head trying to turn me into a small snack. If I hadn't slipped out the back of the Mystery Machine when you put it down on the roof of the bank to rip the driver'sdoor off, I would have gone straight to your hips."

"Did you get anything out of all that rambling?" Daphne looked to Velma.

"Fred," Velma started analytically serious. "I can assure you that there is no physical way for Daphne to become..." The sound of the ground groaned nearby as Velma looked around. Scooby jumped into Shaggy's arms as their heads and eyes turned up over the sixth story roof of the apartment house on the street corner. A large head of red hair barely broke over the top of it as a deserted Cadillac was crushed under a size seventy. Coming around the corner was the source of Fred's confusion. A fifty foot tall Daphne Blake slowly turned her head to them and excitedly grinned her seven foot wide grin.

"Oh boy," Her one ton hands caressed her flawless abdomen. "More people to eat."

"Jinkies!" Velma squealed first. Scooby was gone first. Shaggy screamed next and pushed Fred out of the way to avoid being anyone's main course. Fred scrambled up to his feet with Velma running past him. Daphne just stood where she still trying to figure out what she was seeing. It was herself as a giant; just what was going on around here? Her jaw dropped and her mind slowly realized what she was seeing as her titanic counterpart started reaching to pick her up like a child's toy.

"Wait a second..." Her two hands lightly cupped her bosom. "My boobies aren't that big!" Her feet started stepping back, but then Shaggy reappeared and held up his finger to the titanic redhead to hold her back. Seemingly confusing the gigantic doppelganger long enough, he tossed Daphne up over his shoulder, left behind her shopping bags and quickly began running to catch up to his lead behind Scooby.

"Come back..." Giant Daphne hastened as well as she could, but her weight at this size kept her from running at her full potential. "I'm so hungry..." Electrical lines spanning the street snapped and crackled against her legs. Abandoned cars were crushed under her feet. The asphalt road crunched under her giant weight and left behind footprints an inch deep in her wake.

"This is impossible!" Velma screamed as she ran. "No one can get that big! It's scientifically impossible!"

"Tell her that!" Fred skidded to a stop as Shaggy ran past him carrying Daphne. He saw a utility truck park at the curb outside the water department and pulled a long pipe out of the back. Treating it like a javelin, he stood his ground, took his stance and threw it with all his might trying to convince Daphne's tremendous clone they were not to be eaten. It looked like the long thin PCP pipe would impale in giant Daphne's heart, but it never reached her. It struck and bounced off something in the air and cast off a ripple effect though the air, buildings around them and even the sky and street in a circular motion. Daphne's giant clone meanwhile continued non-stop. She was too large and heavy to be running and could only hasten her walking to catch up with them. She struck the top floor of the museum frustratedly and sent several tons of rock and concrete falling to earth.

"Come back here!" Her bellowing ordered them like a mother screaming at her kids. "I'll swallow, but I won't chew!"

"Guys," Shaggy stood in the steps in the sidewalk down to the subway. "Down here!"

"Since when do we have a subway in town!" Velma descended down into the dark creepy darkness into a subway station. The lights flickered a bit on their arrival, but stayed on. The terminal at the bottom was deserted and the empty pit for the subway was empty. They raced down the length of the boarding area to the far end as their titanic captor reached her long twenty feet arm down the stairway and started feeling around with her long fingers for signs of human life.

"Please..." The giant red-haired beauty cried out. "I'm so hungry!"

"I know how she feels." Shaggy looked to Scooby. Fred had dropped into the pit and had helped Daphne down by him. Velma hopped down too as Shaggy and Scooby joined them. The subway tunnel was dark, but illuminated by random lights. Over their heads, they heard Daphne's giant clone ripping up the street trying to get to them. Her pounding, furious strikes and enraged fits sounded like a war zone above them on the surface, but it gradually subsided as the gang hastened further underground. The tunnels stretched out ahead of them along railroad tracks. Lights showed them the streets they were under while red lights indicated power boxes and conduits.

"This is one weird world..." Fred mumbled under his breath. "Giant women..."

"Ghosts..." Shaggy added.

"And no people..." Velma revealed another observation. Somehow, it all had to add together, but how? The stray newspapers blowing through town suggested this town was full of people only a week ago, but then something must have happened that made everyone into ghosts and maybe a select few into giants. It was almost as if they were in someone's bad dream.

"Velma," Fred sidled up behind her. "Did you see that ripple effect back there? It was almost as if there was a force field in the air."

"Yes," Velma stopped and thought it out. "Let's think of this as another mystery. We have a city without people, food without taste, ghosts..."

"A giant reject from Dude Where's My Car..." Shaggy pointed out the last one.

"Hey, hey," Daphne took offense and tossed aside her fur coat and stolen jewelry. "That was me back there. She was just hungry. I'm sure before she got that big she was just like me: warm, friendly and very attractive so I don't want to hear anything nasty about my other me."

"Daphne, you tried to eat us back there!" Shaggy clarified the matter while Scooby stood on his back legs and folded his arms disgusted with her.

"Guys, guys..." Fred took charge. "I don't think we'll ever find Nick. Let's get as close to the school as possible, return to our world and let the authorities know what we..." Fred heard the rumbling and thundering approach of a subway car coming closer. Quickly lifting Daphne and then Velma on to a deserted platform, he looked up to the light coming toward them and started struggling to join them. Shaggy helped him up as the long train of cars roared up closer and began lurching to a stop like a metallic dinosaur. The windows were black and darkened and the metal shell was rusted and derelict from years of neglect. When the whole train of cars came to a stop and the doors opened up, the gang gazed upon the thin, ghostly passengers traveling the line. It was filled with ghosts sitting in cobwebbed seats and holding on to dingy ceiling straps. A spectral conductor in black had a skull for a head while he stared out to the gang and they stared back to him in petrified shock unable to move.

"Zoinks!" Shaggy couldn't move.

"Need a ride, kids?" The conductor offered the four and their dog.

"No, thank you, sir," Fred stammered. "We're doing just fine."

The skull-faced conductor just nodded his ghastly head, removed his cap and scratched what was left of his hair. The other ghosts and apparitions on board stayed where they were as the doors closed once more and the subway lurched to a stop once more. While it slowly picked up speed, the gang noticed a headless trainman hanging off the back and waving a lantern at them. Letting go with his wrong bony hand, he fell off the train, recollected his dropped lantern and started chasing the subway to get back on it.

"That's something you never see..." Daphne's eye were as large as dinner plates. Shaggy and Scooby fainted next to her.

"Well," Fred stammered scared to death. "At least they were considerate..."


	4. Chapter 4

4

From the deep bowels of an urban subway system under the foundations of Coeursville, four young adults and their big dog finally found light and merged from a would-be underworld into the world and wonderful exterior daylight. Fred shielded his eyes against the sun after getting used to the light while Daphne strolled forth pulling on her purloined sunglasses. Scooby dashed ahead to make friends with a tree while Velma mentally did some seducing where they were. This alternate reality was almost like their world, but not quite. The Coeursville of their world did not have a subway and judging by the straight line they had taken, they should have come up through the Saugus River. Instead, she discovered her and her friends upon an exterior railroad tunnel in the middle of suburbia America. The train tracks continued ahead of them into infinity into an horizon resembling a perfect Norman Rockwell painting or a table top train blown to full size. To their right was constant wilderness of thick woods, impassable brush and forestry as far as she could see. On the other side were the backyards of private homes built against the train tracks. The earth down to these yards were steep and awkward and possessed the presence of absent children who spent their childhood by crushing pennies on the tracks and climbing on the trestle. Shaggy stretched his arms over to crack his back into place and survey these environs with her.

"Aw, sunlight... finally!" He grinned eager to get out of that haunted subway tunnel. "Where to now, Velma."

"I'm not sure." Velma was still mentally computing distance and space. "According to my estimations, we should be arriving at the river. Instead, we seem to have emerged on the edge of suburbia."

"Velma, your computations may be off just a bit." Fred reasoned. "After all, we were lost underground for a good while."

"Another observation, Fred," Velma checked her watch. "My digital watch is set perfect to Greenwich Time and tells me that it is going on seven o'clock. So why is the sun still straight up in the sky?"

"What's that mean?" Daphne asked aloud.

"It means it's already dinner time, and Scooby and I are starving!" Shaggy rubbed his stomach while Scooby struggled to stay on his feet and then passed out with his legs sticking straight up in the air.

"Shaggy's right..." Velma pointed out. "Not only does this reality seem to be desolate, deserted and terrorized by giant doppelgangers and ghosts, but it also seems distorted by altered rules of space, time and physics."

"I hear voices." Shaggy cocked his head as Scooby came to life and started making noises of devotion to him almost identical to a human voice.

"Could be ghosts!" Scooby was making sounds of an almost human voice again.

"I hear voices too." Fred looked around. Maybe the city was deserted, but the suburbs were still inhabited. He looked to one backyard and then raced up the tracks a few feet trying to tell where the voices were coming from. Daphne turned just a bit and looked down a worn path, over a creek and up a small hill to a large backyard behind a large colonial-style house with a swimming pool. She couldn't see people, but she heard the sound of a body off a diving board and then a splash of water.

"Guys, this way!" She lead the way to the private party she was hearing. The awkward childhood path took them away from the train tunnel and over the creek flowing into the subterranean sewer system. A small hop over the running creek and then a short trek up the opposite bank into a private property. At the top of the short hill, they stood and looked upon a vast meticulously kept yard with trees of oak, spruce and fir and then ahead to a swimming pool surrounded by tanning ladies, bathing suit clad beauties and cosmetically enhanced perfect bodies too perfect to be real. The house itself was vast and intimidating: a regal and opulent mansion three stories tall with turrets, bay windows and balconies designed for the lives of the financially secure.

"Finally," Daphne stood ready to be accepted by them. "My kind of people." She pressed forward ready to be indoctrinated into their hedonistic lifestyle. There was not a single male to be seen among them. Fred glanced to Velma and Shaggy curiously as they advanced, but upon closer examination, he discovered these were not just mere ordinary women. They were actresses and female celebrities he had seen in television and the movies. All of them were beautiful, sexy and attractive beyond belief. Janet Jackson was sipping lemonade in her seat while in the presence of Phoebe Cates recreating her famous pool stance from the teen stoner movie that made her famous. Christina Ricci wringed pool water from her long dark tresses as she lifted herself from the pool. Hillary Duff helped apply tanning lotion to the back of Lindsay Lohan. Britney Spears sat between Melissa Joan Hart and Christina Aguilera. Crystal Bernard was ascending the steps to the dining board with Courtney Thorne Smith and Kimberly Williams-Paisley behind her in matching black bathing suits. Kaley Cuoco, Lynsey Bartilson and Tiffani Thiessen rushed from a patio and jumped straight into the pool. The large splash of water suddenly annoyed Courtney Cox and Shannen Doherty trying to get their tans. Jessica Simpson strolled by with her healthy figure contained by a black bathing suit past Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood. The American Idol beauties wore towels as skirts as they joined their voices in song near the picnic table, but Paula Abdul and Cyndi Lauper gently brushed them off from it. Alicia Silverstone and Kristy Swanson ran taunting Alyssa Milano with the top of her bikini with good-natured teasing. Jennifer Love Hewitt lowered her book at poolside at the arrival of the four strangers from the train tracks. Gillian Anderson, Emma Samms and Markie Post also directed their attentions to the arrival of the four lost detectives, but instead of trying to shoo them off, they rushed to greet them with open arms.

"Welcome! Welcome!" Kate Winslet handed Fred a daiquiri and graced Daphne with an iced tea. "Please join us."

"The pool house is over there if you'd like to change into something more comfortable." Reese Witherspoon pointed over beyond Gillian Anderson, Teri Hatcher and Heather Locklear. "We just love guests." She tilted her head lovingly with a bit of her sunny Legally Blonde persona.

"We're not staying long." Velma replied distantly interested but morbidly fascinated.

"Where's the food!" Shaggy cocked his eagerly to fill his stomach.

"Over there!" Raven-haired Jessica Alba pointed to the patio five feet over the pool and chairs. Directed into the right direction, Shaggy hurried with Scooby racing ahead of him. Dodging Mila Kunis and running between Ashley and Mary Kate Olsen, they quickly began loading plates with fried chicken, barbecued ribs, mashed potatoes, corn cobs and portions of everything else. Shakira had to get out of the way to keep from being added to their celebration of gluttony.

"Excuse me," Velma turned analytically suspicious. "But how long have you ladies been here?"

"We live here." Salma Hayek adjusted her bikini bottom and then drifted away with Penelope Cruz.

"Yes," Katie Holmes looked to Fred eager to be a good hostess. "The house has over two hundred rooms and we love it here. There's nothing to do but play and have fun."

"We sing." Kelly Clarkson confessed.

"And we have a wonderful library." Drew Barrymore pulled her waist-length blonde tresses into a ponytail. "It's not like we're a bunch of brainless idiots."

"We did have to kick out Jenny McCarthy and Pamela Anderson for bringing down our collective I.Q.'s." Shannon Elizabeth added.

"Anna-Nicole Smith?" Velma asked.

"Who?" Reese turned to Kate and Shannon.

"Isn't she the one who wondered off?" Renee O'Connor scratched her head of long dark blonde hair.

"No, that was Tara Reid."

"Hey!" Tara picked up a bucket of children and threw it at Kate for that remark. Sitting at a patio table with Mila Kunis, Shaggy and Scooby had sat down ready to eat, but after a few bites, they were recalling the same awful taste of the food from the hotel. The chicken was fake, the taste vanished from their drinks and the barbecue was artificial. Mila bolted from their gagging responses and Ali Larter turned away to sit elsewhere.

"Guys, taste this." Shaggy cringed hungrily at the food. It looked good, but it was horrible. Velma took the egg roll he offered, sniffed it suspectingly and then broke it like a scientist. She then took a tiny taste to sample it, and then spit out the stuff on her tongue rather than swallow it.

"There's something seriously wrong here." She announced out loud. "This food is fake as if we were on a giant move set. It's just something based on an incredible manufactured illusion. Think about it, Fred. Nothing has made sense here. Ghosts, a deserted city, a giant clone of Daphne, food without taste or substance and these women..." Velma pointed across to Madonna and Gwen Stefani. "Both Madonna, Emma Samms and Markie Post have the youthful appearances from the beginnings of the carriers while both the Olsens and Mila Kunis have the appearances of older, more mature women at the pinnacles of their careers."

"I also don't recall Gwen Stefani, Hillary Duff or the Olsens being..." Daphne gestured a bit. "Quite so bosomy either. I think we should move on a bit."

"But we can't be disrespectful to our hosts." Fred grinned as Christina Applegate flirted with him a bit. "We can stay a little while."

"No, we can't!" Daphne stamped her foot to make a stand.

"Daphne," Fred chuckled a bit. "Are you jealous of these ladies?"

"Would you two good people like a piece of sushi?" Sara Michelle Gellar popped up while wearing a floral skirt and top. Briefly interrupting Fred, she held up her plate of small portions of sushi.

"Excuse me, Buffy, but I'm having a conversation with my girlfriend." Fred told her as Sara squealed a bit upset and left them pouting. Daphne just took a second look at the blonde vampire-killer and wondered why she looked familiar or why that usually petite actress was now sporting a thirty-four double-d bust size.

"I beginning to think we never really left the high school." Velma reacted afraid of these nonsensical surroundings.

"Gang, let's sit, rest a while..." Fred briefly admired Wynona Ryder with her hair long again. From over his head, a shingle off the house just barely missed him and a few others rained down off the roof. Lindsay Lohan began screaming her head off and Reese Witherspoon cocked her head up the sky. Fred lifted his head to the roof of the house and saw Daphne's giant clone over the top of the edifice. She pulled the cupola out of her line of view and tried reaching over the large mansion for the cornucopia of normal people at her feet.

"Jackpot!" Her eyes glistened hungrily at the normal people just out of her reach.


	5. Chapter 5

5

The white and black-trimmed mansion known as Olympia suddenly spilled forward with two hundred beautiful women pouring from its front doors. Reese Witherspoon hit the gas of her red jaguar trying to get away and rolled over the toes of the red-headed Titaness looming over her. Her jaguar flipped over and she raced away between her friends and comrades scattering to the neighborhood beyond their gated community. Markie Post jumped out of the way of the plate glass window in the foyer shattering. Jessica Alba pulled Alyssa Milano from the giant hand reaching into the structure. The roof groaned from weight atop it and the third floor attic vanished under crushed roof beams and shattered support beams. Anna Faris began screaming her head off as she felt herself lifted up by giant fingers, tossed up into the air like a peanut and dropped into the gullet of the cannibal goddess attacking the mansion.

"Scooby Doo!" Shaggy's voice cried out. "Where are you!"

"Raggy!" Scooby looked round while Crystal Bernard and Cheryl Ladd tumbled over the Great Dane stopping before them. The front of the house was being ripped off by Daphne's starving clone. Drew Barrymore clutched at the banister of the stairway to keep from being lifted up but instead felt herself pulled away from it and lifted up out of sight. There was a gulp, a swallow and then the return of two giant hands scoping out the mansion interior.

"It's times like this I wish we really were witches." Holly Marie Combs turned to Robin Tunney.

"I wish you were witches too!" Fred screamed over the sounds of the crunching mansion, female cries of terror and panic and rushing bare feet on the parquet floor.

"We're not witches?" Melissa Joan Hart wondered why her incantations weren't working then found herself lifted up off her feet by giant fingers. A twenty-five year old Liz Montgomery rushed to save her, but instead had to be rescued herself by actress Beverley Owen and a twenty-something Jane Leeves.

"This way!" Raven Simone and Lynsey Bartilson pushed Fred and Velma to the garage on the estate. The second floor was now caving in and plaster walls cracked as Giant Daphne cracked the once opulent mansion apart at the seams. Lindsay Lohan ducked under a fallen floor beam ahead of Shaggy. Scooby Doo was rushing up beside actresses Renee O'Connor, Jaclyn Smith and Britney Spears. Reunited with Scooby, they saw the Knight Industries Two Thousand from the TV series Knight rider being driven away with Kristy Swanson at the wheel. Alicia Silverstone jumped into the Batmobile parked in the garage of classic cars trying to get away. Between Herbie the Love Bug and the Munsters Coach, the Mystery Machine sat pinned down by a section of ceiling.

"Out of the way, Buffy!" Fred pushed Sara Michelle Gellar out of the driver's seat. "I drive!"

"My name is..." Gellar cried and found herself pushed over the seat by Daphne and Velma.

"I hated your show!" Daphne squeezed next to Fred. Turning over the engine, Fred watched as Lohan and Duff evacuated under the legs of the giant Daphne tearing the house apart. The tires started spinning under the Mystery Machine as the weight of the second floor prevented it from moving. Debbe Dunning bolted out of their way for the Tool Time van. Looking out the back windows, Scooby and Shaggy were joined by Ali Larter and Brigitte Wilson saw Kate Winslet in another classic car. Hitting the gas and trying to push them out of the way, Kate was pushing against them with that magic motor car Chitty Chitty Bang Bang . Mila Kunis and a very twenty-something Erin Moran jumped into the seats with her as Fred continued gunning the engine. The garage entrance was gradually collapsing. There was a crunch of wood, a squeal of tires and the Mystery Machine suddenly lurched forward and launched forward.

"Here we go!" Fred screamed in victory, but as the roof of the Mystery Machine grazed the top of the garage entrance, the wheels suddenly left the ground and was hoisted up into the air. Velma looked out at the windows as Giant Daphne's body passed up before them.

"We're going to die!" Gellar screamed and Daphne punched her out.

"I can't believe I'm back here!" Fred recalled being in another Mystery Machine in this same predicament hours earlier. "Strap yourselves in!" The engine cut out while the van started tilting back and Ali and Brigitte held on tight in back. The back popped open and Gellar tumbled out, bounced off Giant Daphne's left breast and landed in a tree. Scooby stretched out over the back of the van's four corners and looked down below. Down below them, the giant clone opened her mouth wide.

"Shaggy, hold on!" Velma screamed clutching her seat.

"I can't!" Shaggy's fingers slipped from the back of the front seat. Tumbling past the two actresses, he knocked Scooby out of the way and began falling. Giant Daphne opened her mouth wide ready to swallow the skinny amateur detective clutching his dog for solace. There was a sound of something in the air, and Shaggy and Scooby were suddenly jerked through the air. They opened their frightened eyes and found themselves in the arms of a webbed wall-crawler descending to the ground with them.

"Are you guys okay?" The voice of Tobey McGuire came from behind the mask of the man in the Spiderman costume.

"Spiderman!" Shaggy and Scooby screamed idol-struck.

Garbed as Superman, Dean Cain tore the Mystery Machine from the hands of the giant clone and delivered it to safety. Growling at the intervention, Giant Daphne reached out again and felt her wrist restrained by Lynda Carter's magic lasso. Velma looked out wondering what was happening and saw the star-spangled actress once more playing Wonder Woman and coming to their rescue. The Michael Keaton Batman restrained the giantess's other arm with bat-rope to the mansion.

"Okay, this is officially the weirdest mystery we've ever had!" She reacted stunned and awe-struck. Giant Daphne quickly began throwing the two heroes around like toys. A living CGI Hulk leapt to the air trying to knock her over while James Marsden as the X-Man Cyclops blasted her several times with eye beams.

"I think we're in one of Nick's crazy daydreams!" Daphne looked out over Velma's shoulder.

"Scott!" Nicole Kidman as the red-haired X-Man Jean Grey screamed as the giant redhead clutched her up. Dean Cain used his Kryptonian power to hit Giant Daphne with a section of train track and then rushed the rescue the redhead. Brian Austin Green blasted into the scene as the Human Torch trying to stop the giantess. Knocked out of the sky in Iron Man Armor, Tom Selleck replaced his helmet and rocketed off again to save the actresses fleeing the mansion.

"Daphne, that's it!" Velma deduced the last of what was happening. "If my guess is right, we never left the school..."

Tyler Mane as Thor rescued Calista Flockhart from the giant clone. Britney Spears and Jane Leeves were rushed to safety by John Wesley Shipp reprising his TV role as the Flash. Cast in the adventure as the hero Green Lantern, Dylan McDermott used energy-created restraints to try containing the redheaded giantess. Back again as Daredevil, Ben Affleck rescued Jennifer Lopez from the collapsing mansion.

"I think we are in some sort of chamber created out the gym of our old school to create incredible holograms." Velma continued as Fred left the van to check the engine. "Everything here is computer-generated like some sort of Star Trek holodeck. That's the only way to explain the incredible illusions being created for us. Everything here has been created from Nick's imagination!"

"Okay, sugar..." Carmen Electra was a different Rogue for the X-Men. Using her powers, she tried clutching the leg of the giant Daphne and forcing herself to gain the giant redhead's power and stature. She only reached ten feet tall before a green-skinned version of obscure actress Roberta Vasquez in the form of the heroine known as the She Hulk had to rescue her. Kevin Sorbo as Hercules swatted the giant once more with an uprooted tree while a living CGI Fantastic Four hero known as the Thing launched himself with the Hulk to help Dean Cain as Superman. On the ground, Hugh Jackman sprouted Wolverine claws and slashed at the giantess trying to cut her tendons.

"Incredible deduction, Velma." Nick Danvers emerged from the shrubbery for the Mystery Machine. Garbed as Indiana Jones, he sent Ali and Brigitte off to safety and stood safe and unharmed from his friends. "What are you guys doing here?"

"Nick!" Fred turned around to face him. "Do you know what sort of things we've been through?"

"Well, it shouldn't be nothing like the trouble I've had trying to turn off my simulations." Nick answered. "I mean, I can only visit the Brady Bunch, Mayberry, Stalag 13, Gilligan's Island and the Munsters about so many times." He paused as Spiderman swung overhead with Kate Winslet in his hands. "You're in my holodeck and I can't shut it off. The ambient noises of the merged programs are drowning out my voice commands."

"How about getting to the computer itself?" Velma asked as actress Roberta Vasquez as the She Hulk was being rescued by Dean Cain as Superman. As the mutant Dazzler, Nicole Richie hurled off a dazzling array of lights to blind the colossal redhead.

"Because..." Nick tossed a piece of mansion off the wall of the disguised gym. "The proximity sensors in line with the tactile floor are designed to keep me fifteen feet from the walls at all times. It's part of the routine distorting perspective and horizon while creating distance. The tactile floor rolls like a treadmill so that no matter how far I go, I never leave the gym."

"Just turn off the illusions, dude!" Shaggy cried out amidst the flurry of bikini clad actresses, heroes and the giant clone.

"Don't you think I've tried?" Nick roared a bit upset then pushed the gang out of the way of a giant foot. "I've been in here for a week! A week! Velma, you must have an idea how to help me turn it off!"

"I haven't a clue!" Velma realized that if Nick couldn't stop his creations then she had no ideas. "Could you create something to trick it into turning itself off?"

"Guys?" Shaggy looked up to Giant Daphne finally keeling over. She was finally falling backward, but they were going to be crushed under her. Daphne clutched Fred as Nick paused and realized what to do.

"Enterprise..." Nick tapped his chest. "Five people and one dog to beam up." He replied. Daphne started screaming as her immense clone started falling. Fred clutched her trying to protect her. Shaggy and Scooby hugged each other for solace and Velma clutched head fearing being crushed under Daphne's giant clone. There was a flash of light and nothing happened. Looking out, she found herself on the transporter pad of the Star Trek Enterprise.

"Ambassador Danvers," Lt. Commander Geordi LaForge stood before them at the console. "Is everything all right?"

"Good job, Geordi..." Nick congratulated a person he considered a better friend than his real-life counterparts. Behind him, Nick noticed Fred, Daphne, Shaggy, Velma and Scooby in stunned silence upon living through a real Star Trek transporter.

"Come on guys..." Nick looked to them. "You don't think I'd be dumb enough to forget to create safeguards against injury."


	6. Chapter 6

PART 6

Fred's jaw dropped at where he was and both Shaggy and Scooby had mixed feelings of fear and glee. They were both here on the deck of both a place and vehicle that could not exist. It might have been built sometime in their lifetime, but they had now beat everyone to experiencing the sensation of being on one of the most famous icons on television to ever exist. It was the USS Enterprise, quite possibly the most famous starship next to the Millennium Falcon. They stepped from the transporter room unable to speak; they could only continue soaking in the visions and sights and the faint hum of distant starship engines propelling them through space. Daphne was equally impressed. She felt as if she were on the set of the television series. She felt a bit apprehensive as well as if she should not have been here. She was so far out of her element here.

"Jinkies!" Velma was equally star struck at the holographically-created environs. A few crewman hastened by her as the vast starship lightly jarred around them from something they couldn't see. Nick just stood by grinning proudly at what he had created. He liked the fact that he held them in awe and that he had something that impressed them. The fact that they hadn't talked in several minutes since they arrival was more than the expectations he wanted.

"Nick..." Velma tried to catch her breath. "How did you do this? Tangible holographic-created illusions are impossible! How did you do this?"

"It was just a few steps away from CGI technology." Nick turned and talked as he looked for something in the hall. "I created a Enterprise prototype on a computer, and then had the computer core scan and download every picture, photo, DVD, VHS tape and whatever else I could find to create the fill size holographic mock-up. I then used a USI computer personality file to create personalities for the characters so they could react and respond to situations exactly as they would be expected to behave."

"That explains the contradictions in town in and the holographic interior of the school." Velma started realizing how everything fit together. "You didn't have photos of everything and your computer system must extrapolate data to fill holes in your data."

"Correct," Nick confirmed. "Unfortunately, I neglected to create a way to separate the files and characters."

"What's that mean?" Shaggy asked.

"The computer tends to merge profiles and locations with common backgrounds." Nick answered. Almost by example, an elevator turbo-lift opened up and Nick and the gang were treated to another surprise. The robot from the TV series Lost in Space came rolling out accompanied by Dr. Zachary Smith and they were very far into character before the star struck amateur detectives.

"We're doomed, I tell you, doomed!" Smith wandered out between Fred and Daphne. "We shall never see Earth now."

"PATIENCE, DOCTOR SMITH..." The robot rolled out talking as well. "CAPTAIN KIRK PROMISED TO GET US SAFELY TO EARTH."

"And what do you know about it you clanking, cantankerous, clucking collage of canned colostomy." Smith shot back at his eternal comic partner as Nick gestured for Scooby and the gang to enter the turbo-lift.

"Just last week I caught them and the Robinsons with the Ewoks from _Revenge of the Jedi._" Nick continued as he stepped back and asked the simulation to deliver them to the bridge of the Enterprise. Shaggy was having fun exploring and examining everything and Scooby was bouncing excitedly to be a part of it all. Velma brushed the wall with her fingertips to study the touch of these solid illusions, but then Daphne realized she had been violated and stood up to Nick.

"I just have one question..." Daphne tossed her red hair one way, leaned on to one leg and looked toward Nick with restrained upset anger. "Why do you have a fifty foot tall simulation of me running around eating people?"

"Yes," Velma responded curiously and analytical wanting to hear an answer to that question. "Who else from real life do you have ensconced in your holographic simulations?"

"Well, I, uh..." Nick started scraping for a response, but his answer would have to wait because another of his secret creations had chosen this awkward time to present herself to her real life counterpart. The turbo-lift opened up to the main bridge with Captain James T. Kirk and Captain Jean-Luc Picard both commanding their respective crew members in battle against the Death star from _Star Wars_. Amidst these merged crews, Velma's head turned and her jaw dropped at one woman before her in particular. She refused to believe what she was seeing and as well refuse to accept the likeness and subtle alteration to the simulated persona she was seeing.

"Admiral, is there any dictation I can take for you?" Ensign Velma Dinkley was garbed in a blue Starfleet uniform that tightly wrapped and held her modest body and figure as she presented herself to Nick. Her hair was longer than her real life counterpart and she lacked eyeglasses, but most noticeable was her large bosom, about the size of a thirty-six inch bust, which jutted forward demanding attention. Her figure was flawless and her abdomen quite thin. Even Velma was envious of that figure. Daphne turned her head in a slow burn simultaneously with Velma toward Nick while they wondered what sort of lewd and unwanted attention they were given to them beyond their knowledge.

"Uh, not at this time..." Nick grinned as Velma and Daphne looked to him both upset and a bit disgusted at what he was doing to them beyond their knowledge.

"Shaggy, look! We're in the Star Wars movie too!" Fred pointed to the view screen as Enterprise Security Chief Worf fired proton torpedoes on the massive Death Star.

"This is officially our coolest adventure yet! Ain't it, Scooby!" Shaggy cried out in glee as Scooby made laughing noises and bounced dancing in one spot.

"Captain," Lieutenant Commander Data sat at his seat at ops. "We just lost contact with Will Robinson in his X-Wing. Captain Solo, however, is now able to patch us in with DS-12."

"Make it so..." Picard stood ready for the transmission. The screen popped on to more TV icons. Joel Robinson, Mike Nelson, and the Bots from _Mystery Science Theater 3000 _appeared on the screen in Starfleet Uniforms.

"Commander Robinson," Picard stood before him. "We are quickly losing our face-off against the Empire. We are requesting assistance."

"Assistance?" Robinson reacted hesitant. "Where were you when we were on the _Planet of The Apes_?"

"I don't know, Picard..." Nelson started playing with the transmission. "Uh, I think the Empire may be trying to block our signal..."

"Ambassador," Captain Kirk recognized Nick. "Please tell us you have had contact with He-Man and She-Ra of Eternia."

"What? Oh, uh, yeah..." Nick started sinking into this fantasy and took a roll beyond the role he had been playing. "Yes, they'll be here, but in the meantime, Picard, I'll need full command of your ship. My team here will assist me if both you and Kirk will move your crews to the main portion of the ship, I'll take control of the saucer system and cover your retreat."

"I'll make it so." Picard gave the order to remove his holographic crew members from the bridge.

"Nick," Fred looked around as the Star Trek characters started departing. Mike, Joel and the Bots blinked off the view screen and returned to the scene of X-Wings and fighter jets in interstellar dogfights over the Death Star. "What are you doing? We're not star fleet pilots."

"Trust me," Nick replied as Doctor Beverly Crusher and then Velma holographic counterpart both separately grabbed the seat of Nick's pants as they departed. Both Velma and Daphne were growing disgusted by the minute "I know what I'm doing."

"I am so erasing myself from your computer." Daphne mumbled out loud.

"Computer..." Nick spoke aloud to the ship simulation. "Full abreast into the Death Star, Warp Ten..."

"Into the Death Star?" Shaggy's eyes went wide and he looked to Scooby. "You crashing the Enterprise on purpose!" Scooby looked to him, to Nick and then started struggling to keep from fainting.

"You want to turn off the holo-deck, right?" Nick replied as the ship's shaking and vibrating started getting worse. Nick braced by the helm while Fred fell into Picard's seat with Daphne in his lap. Velma held on to a computer console while Shaggy raced for the turbo-lift to keep from getting killed. The ship was shaking apart around them. Nick stood as a defiant messenger into destruction as the Enterprise bridge ripped apart. A fire burst from one computer console and a piece of the helm crashed inside as electronic sparks flew from twisted computer banks. The vibrating and shaking was joined by Daphne and Velma screaming together. Shaggy and Scooby screamed louder than them together as the universe blinked out around them. There was a flash of light and Fred clutched Daphne tight. The noises stopped and he slowly opened his eyes.

He and Daphne were on the floor of their old high school once more. Shaggy and Scooby found themselves clawing at doors that no longer existed. Velma noticed the wispy images of a vanishing Enterprise console disappearing in the air. The picture of the school cougar mascot was in the floor once more and the missing water fountain was right where Fred knew it was supposed to be. The rest of the gym had been stripped bare of bleachers or basketball posts and painted in silver with numerous mirrors surrounding them. The domed roof with its nearly countless roof supports was nearly obscured with electronic lights, proximity sensors, holographic projectors and myriad mirrors and other devices.

"Nick..." Fred lifted himself and Daphne off the floor where Picard's chair had vanished under them. "You destroyed your illusions for us."

"No," Nick walked over to the electronically-locked doors leading to the hallway. "I just forced an end to that simulation. All the images are still stored in memory ready to be recreated when I want... but not until I get the voice commands confirmed." He hotwired the doors and they swung open by themselves. Just a few feet out, his sister Jessica stood by with his boss, Robert Hogan, Owner and Chief Stockholder of the Universal Science Institute, and two of his peers with their toolboxes, Russell Coleman and Matt Burton, both of them from out of the computer programming division of the company.

"We were getting worried about you." Hogan replied to the holographic survivors then beamed an impressed token of surprise. "How was it?"

"Better than I believed..." Nick told his boss. "But we still got major problems before opening this as a contained amusement park."

"All's well that ends well..." Fred looked around. "First thing we gotta do is get food to..." He looked back into the holographic gym. "Shaggy, Scooby, what are you guys doing?"

"We know how it works now!" Shaggy was grinning ear to ear. "Computer, one giant hamburger, giant sub sandwich, chocolate fantasy land for Scooby and I." There was a chiming ring to the air as the floor turned green and sprouted with grass. A chocolate river and waterfall formed nearby along with a sub sandwich twenty feet long and twelve feet high. A computer-generated hamburger reaching two stories tall appeared amidst lollipop trees, candy cane lamp posts and scattered five-hundred pound gummy bears. Gene Wilder appeared as Willie Wonka from behind the sub sandwich, leaned on it and turned his cane while a loose motley collection of kids appeared racing around Shaggy and Scooby.

"Shaggy, what are you doing?" Velma looked at them. "You can't eat it; it's not real."

"We know..." Shaggy and Scooby was in love. "But we can try!" They charged at the sandwich and dove into it crawling through the roast beef and ham. A few feet away, a fat boy was sucked up a pipe and girl chewing gum turned into a giant blueberry. Gene Wilder just wandered through twirling his cane before the material witnesses listening to his singing.

"A world of pure imagination..." His song continued revealing a lot more than just a little music tune.

END


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